Now that the New Year has started, we’re turning to our crystal ball to give you predictions for the cricket industry in 2025.
Note: In case you missed it, we recently counted off the top stories of 2024 in 3 parts:
Part 1 Year in review: 2024’s top cricket industry stories #1-#15
Part 2 Year in review: 2024’s top cricket industry stories #16-#30
Part 3 Year in review: 2024’s top cricket industry stories #31-#45
Here are our 2025 predictions:
1) New owners of The Hundred franchises will force a change in format to T20
The nation that brought us the English language, the sport of cricket, and the T20 format for some reason decided in 2021 that it needed to tweak the format that led to cricket’s recent commercial explosion.
Now that The Hundred is bringing in private investors from all over the world, already including one IPL team and possibly others, the new ownership stakeholders will collectively steer the tournament toward T20 to align better with their other properties.
While this might not happen for the 2025 tournament, the conversation will start this year and this will happen eventually.
2) Support for Afghanistan women will grow, including more cancellations of bilateral Men’s matches
2024 saw the Afghanistan Women’s cricket team in exile cry for help.
The support and pressure that built over the year culminated in some cancellations of bilateral matches with the Men’s teams.
The outcry continues to build momentum and 2025 will see more calls to boycott the Men’s team. While it is unlikely to result in refusal to play Afghanistan in ICC tournaments, including the upcoming Champions Trophy, more pressure will build on the bilateral front and the Afghanistan Men will struggle with finding bilateral series partners.
3) ICC will take the lead on tackling player non-payment
Player payment will become a hot issue in 2025.
Multiple franchise tournaments as well as national boards are apparently behind on player payments
Case in point: the Bangladesh Premier League.
The WCA has tried to tackle this. However, the ICC is best positioned to tackle this issue. It holds the levers of withholding sanctioning from franchise tournaments and prohibiting countries from playing in its tournaments.
As the outcry builds on this front in 2025, the ICC will be pressured to take more aggressive action.
4) The WCA will take the lead on the playing calendar issue, though progress will be limited
The playing calendar will become another hot issue in 2025 as new T10 and T20 tournaments continue to mushroom, and as national boards continue to pressure players to play domestically.
The reality is the calendar is finite and there is already way too much Men’s professional cricket to stuff into 365 days and tournaments and series will continue to step on each other’s traditional spots in the calendar.
It already feels like too much, and the WCA will do its best to push the issue. That said, unlike #3, this is a cat-herding job where no one entity has full control.
5) ECB will fold in its standoff vs PCA over PSL
The ECB took a stand in 2024 against players participating in overseas franchise leagues that interfere with England’s domestic summer. The ECB indicated that it would stop issuing No Objection Certificates for these tournaments, except for players holding a white-ball-only contract.
Players would be barred from competing in leagues overlapping with the County season, The Hundred or T20 Blast and also from participating in tournaments suspected of corruption.
Additionally, cricketers would be prohibited from “double-dipping,” i.e., switching to a new tournament after being eliminated from another happening simultaneously.
English players, led by the Professional Cricketers Association (PCA) under Darryl Mitchell, quickly voiced their objections to the decision and how it was handled and communicated. They even considered legal action against the ECB.
Encouraged by the PCA, several players registered for the PSL draft and were, in fact, drafted.
The ECB now has a standoff on its hands.
In 2024, several New Zealand players opted out of central contracts in order to prioritize franchise cricket, and national boards of other test nations can’t afford more of the same.
In the end, the ECB will have no choice but to go ahead and issue these NOCs.
Name of Author: Zee Zaidi
